Two distinct components, alpha and beta chains, which compose the high affinity receptor for human granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF) do not contain any catalytic domains of known enzymes. However, in mouse lymphoid cell lines transfected with cDNAs of the both chains, GM-CSF triggers tyrosine phosphorylation of several cellular proteins and allows continuous proliferation. To elucidate whether the high affinity receptor functions in nonhematopoietic cells, we have reconstituted human GM-CSF receptor in mouse NIH3T3 fibroblasts. In NIH3T3 clones, in which the high affinity receptor is reconstituted, human GM-CSF has triggered rapid tyrosine phosphorylation of cellular proteins, transfected beta chain, and another protein of 40-45 kDa. Moreover, human GM-CSF stimulated DNA synthesis and induced morphological transformation. These observations indicate that coordinately expressed alpha and beta chains of human GM-CSF receptor activates intrinsic protein-tyrosine kinases by the stimulation with human GM-CSF and that the activated protein-tyrosine kinases phosphorylate tyrosine residues of an intrinsic 40-45-kDa protein and the transfected beta chain in NIH3T3 cells. Activation of the protein-tyrosine kinases is likely to have biological functions to induce DNA synthesis and morphological transformation of mouse fibroblasts.